Just before this past Shabbos a very curious flyer hit our mailbox. It was written in Hebrew and had the identical text on both sides: Israel was joining an international treaty that would transfer all authority to declare and control future outbreaks to none other than the World Health Organization, WHO. This has to be one of the worst governmental decisions in recent memory.
I had heard about the attempt to give the WHO extraordinary power and responsibility by letting it essentially usurp local and national health organizations and officials to declare a pandemic and to tell all countries what to do (lockdowns, reduced travel, etc.). It has been a dream of the international left and the self-appointed elite to have international and transnational bodies replace such ancient things like independent countries and local government (one reason why the US has no effective southern border under the current administration). The UN was supposed to be that body but its incompetence and chronic corruption have made it a poster child for why international bodies do not work and generally fail spectacularly (have you seen the list of brutal states on the UN human rights commission?). Brexit was largely driven by the British people no longer wanting to have faceless bureaucrats in Brussels tell them how to live and routinely overrule the internal British legal system, including the British high court. I remember when the EU tried to tell member state restaurants the shape of olive oil containers that could be put on restaurant tables and how this overreach did not sit well with the locals.
So Israel and other countries (but notably possibly not the USA) will let the WHO determine when a pandemic takes place. There are a couple cases of monkeypox in the country and a few dozen worldwide—what if the WHO declares it a pandemic? What if the WHO tells Israel to institute draconian lockdowns with UN officials coming to check to see that they are enforced? Have you seen the videos of people in Shanghai screaming from their towers at night that they are dying of hunger and that they want out? Is Israel ready to give the Chinese-leaning WHO the power to lock the folks into Azrieli and other Tel Aviv towers only to come out once every few days to get a bag of food?
The WHO, like Drs. Fauci and Collins, as well as Israeli officials showed enormous incompetence during the recent Covid pandemic. The WHO kowtowed to China and would not accept early Taiwanese data and passed along China’s talking points about the virus not passing from human to human. It did not push China to open the Wuhan Virus Institute or to get access to early blood samples and lab books. It all but glossed over the possibility that the virus came from the Wuhan Institute (funny that Strauss could not blame its Salmonella problem on a local market or the like). It was completely under China’s thumb and for its incompetence and malfeasance it has been rewarded with the power to close the world down based on its own calculations and interests. Drs. Fauci and Collins repeatedly contradicted themselves on orders and privately said things—like standard masks not working—that they refused to say publicly. When the Great Barrington Declaration came out and gave a far more reasonable approach to dealing with the virus, said doctors conspired—as shown by emails—as how to publicly denigrate the signatories so as not to have to deal with a challenge to their authority. Israeli officials opened and closed the airport, canceled flights and school and gave out thousands of fines for failure to wear masks outdoors, where the risks of infection were near zero. While some of the mistakes can be attributed to the newness of the pandemic and a lack of knowledge on how to deal with it, much of that which took place was calculated and was not in order to defeat the pandemic or protect the public but rather to show power and make it clear who makes the decisions—you can travel if we let you. You can work or send your kids to school if we let you.
So why were the experts shown during the Covid pandemic to be such losers? Years back, a book came out that analyzed predictions in all areas of human endeavor and concluded that the bigger the “expert” the greater the likelihood that he or she predicted incorrectly. Why? Such an outcome seems to be the opposite of that which we would expect. Experts know everything and should be the best-positioned to give sound and meaningful advice or orders. How could they get things so wrong so often? The simple answer has to do with the word “expert”. As people become experts, something very interesting and very wrong happens. Think about a young man starting in journalism, right out of college. He does not have a clue how “real journalism”, as opposed to that which he learned in college, works. How do you find out what’s going on at city hall? How can you get a scoop on the bigger, rival paper? If he’s smart, he attaches himself to seasoned reporters and over time, years or even decades, learns the ropes. Send flowers to the mayor’s secretary and you’ll know the subject of his next news conference. Always speak to the chief of police after his workout as he is in a better mood….Eventually, our greenhorn becomes an “expert”–he knows the ropes and the ways of his profession. As one who is called an expert, or worse, actually calls himself an expert, he now has the worst trait, namely that of pride. He won’t listen to anyone—he’s the expert. He won’t ask people of lower rank anything—he’s the expert. When he gets stuck, he is too proud to admit the same—he’s the expert. So as people become experts and are brought out onto news shows under that title, their ability to be open to criticism, to ask questions, to look at questions in a new way is highly reduced. And when they are shown to be wrong, they only double down. “How can that clown at the gas station tell me that I was wrong about masks? Who does he think he is? We will go for double masking!” And thus the comedy of errors that led to death, economic destruction, loss of companionship, depression, suicide, lack of schooling, and fear was born. Sure, everyone can be a Monday morning quarterback and say how things should have been done with Covid, but if you look and listen, our experts do not admit any mistakes; they quarter no dissent. Fauci’s yoyo approach to masks brings no apology. The massive number of cases worldwide of Omicron for the fully vaccinated should have led to some soul-searching about the efficacy of vaccines, but there has been none. Only Tucker Carson mentions the thousands reported dead or injured from Covid vaccines as recorded by the governmental VAERS database—the experts never mention it. The experts cannot be wrong! The experts have spoken and it is for us to simply shut up and accept their errors, because, obviously, they’re the experts and you know nothing, so do as you are told. As a person becomes more knowledgeable and proficient at his trade, he must remain humble and realize that even the least educated might have an insight that he has missed—thus he can find new information and ideas and not feel that he has soiled his honor to get them. A little modesty would have made the response to Covid far more successful and acceptable to the public.
One of the points of the new arrangement with the WHO is that it is the WHO who will declare a pandemic. As we saw from Covid, not all countries experienced the various versions of the virus equally at the same time. Weather, location, and population makeup seemed to have a huge impact on whether a country had it bad or not. Yet, the WHO can take its sledgehammer and tell Israel to take the same steps that the Chinese are taking (remember that the Chinese locked people into their buildings and confiscated apartments to make them into Covid wards) with penalty for noncompliance. Joining such an agreement that ties the hands of local health officials is foolish and potentially dangerous. However incompetent the locals may be, there is a chance that they understand the local situation better and might, just maybe, do the right thing to keep the economy going while keeping the population safe. And one of the biggest disasters from Covid has been the usurpation of politicians’ responsibilities by bureaucrats. Health ministers, like economic ministers, should advise the prime minister and the latter should make decisions based on a complex calculus of health, economy, security, and national needs. Instead, health officials unilaterally determined when the airport would be open or if there would be fans at a soccer match. I did not vote for the health minister; I voted for his boss who has relinquished his authority to someone completely immune from political responsibility for bad decisions. The politicians have given away their authority to unelected officials and now Israel has given away its power to faceless bureaucrats from a failed international body that is more pro-China than pro-Truth.
So the next time you see an expert on TV, change channels. And the next time you meet a person who calls himself an expert in his field, run for the hills.
